Stephanie van der Merwe discovered her passion for food during her studies, where she completed a Bachelor of Science, majoring in Human Nutrition.
“I saw it as a place where I could channel my creativity and combine it with my passion for good food,” described van der Merwe.
After graduating in 2018, van der Merwe began her vegan food company. The lessons she learned from owning a vegan food company informed her decision to transfer her specialised vegan recipes to a cookie company named The Vegan Treatory.
The mission was simple, to replace existing and beloved treats on the market with mouth-watering, superior-tasting vegan alternatives. van der Merwe dedicated three months to perfecting cookie recipes that could be delivered fresh from the oven to the customer’s door.
“We launched with three classic flavours, delivering Auckland-wide, but demand quickly grew, and The Vegan Treatory expanded nationwide within the first month.”
The Vegan Treatory now boasts over 50 unique, limited edition flavours with adventurous and witty names, including the ‘Jacinnamon Ardern Cookie’, all delivered nationwide from their online store, thanks to the hand-rolling cookie efforts of a modest, hard-working team of three women.
With an Italian background, van der Merwe's passion for creating her vegan recipes is as much to do with the cultural significance of food as a medium for family and celebration as it does with her desire to be creative and innovate through her treats.
Rewarded by the fact that her products are so profoundly enjoyed up and down New Zealand, van der Merwe described that the pride she feels when hearing of her customer’s surprise by her vegan cookies never diminishes.
“Watching sceptical first-time tasters go from: "It's...vegan? It can't be that good," to "oh my gosh, it's vegan? This is the best cookie I've ever had, that never gets old.”
She explained that competing with non-vegan treats with vegan products requires the vegan alternative to be equally enjoyed compared to their non-vegan options to avoid customers feeling like losing out.
However, she also stated that vegan products must be innovative and unique, with unseen flavours on the market.
“We've just launched the Matcha Biscoff Cookie, made with matcha brown sugar cookie dough, white chocolate chunks, and a Biscoff cookie butter filling. Matcha is quite polarising, so we hope to win over all those fence-sitters with this unique (and delicious) combo.”
For the future, van der Merwe has stated that she wants to launch three new product ranges at The Vegan Treatory, to which she has been dedicating her time for the last 18 months. She also reveals that one of her projects includes the release of 100 percent vegan frozen cookie dough, which can be baked or eaten raw by cookie lovers nationwide.
van der Merwe did not divulge the two other projects she hopes to release.
“My goal is to expand The Vegan Treatory into the supermarket space and to see our treats in more hands all around the country.”
